What Does Ezekiel 36:32 Mean in the King James?
Not for your sakes do I this, saith the Lord GOD, be it known unto you: be ashamed and confounded for your own ways, O house of Israel.
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
God’s action toward you is not a verdict that your own ways were right; it brings those ways into recognition.
THE MEANING
What God does is not earned by your worthiness. The verse brings your own ways into recognition and names the shame and humiliation they carry without softening them. Divine action and your responsibility stand together.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The lie that receiving God’s good action proves your ways were right is undone: this action is not for your sake, and your ways are still named as shameful.
THE ROOT
יִוָּדַע
yivvadaʿ
GROWS FROM
ידע
y-d-ʿ
Know, recognize, perceive.
The form means “let it be known to you,” but the root carries recognition, not merely receiving information. The verse’s exposure is personal: you come to perceive your own ways as yours.
ALSO GROWS
yādaʿ: Know, perceive
יָדַע
The verb names recognition itself, showing that the verse calls for your ways to come into view within your own awareness.
daʿat: Knowledge, perception
דַּעַת
This related noun connects knowing with what is grasped and recognized, giving weight to “be it known unto you.”
מִדַּרְכֵיכֶם
middarkheikhem
GROWS FROM
דרך
d-r-k
Tread, step; the path formed by walking.
The word for “ways” is rooted in treading: a way is a course made by steps. Your ways are not an abstract label here; they are the lived tracks that become visible and bring shame.
ALSO GROWS
derek: Way, road, course
דֶּרֶךְ
This is the path-word used in the verse; its root image of treading makes “your ways” concrete as a course formed by what is walked.
dārakh: Tread, step
דָּרַךְ
The verb supplies the action beneath the noun: a path is made by footsteps, linking a person’s course with the steps that shape it.
THE PATTERN
God’s action rests on God’s own name and purpose rather than human merit, while the person’s own wrong remains exposed.
Therefore say unto the house of Israel, Thus saith the Lord GOD; I do not this for your sakes, O house of Israel, but for mine holy name’s sake, which ye have profaned among the heathen, whither ye went.For thy name’s sake, O LORD, pardon mine iniquity; for it is great.But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.THE THREAD
For I know him, that he will command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of the LORD, to do justice and judgment; that the LORD may bring upon Abraham that which he hath spoken of him.Genesis 18:19 joins the same roots: יָדַע (yadaʿ, know or perceive) and דֶּרֶךְ (derek, way or path). There the way is kept; in Ezekiel, the people’s own ways are brought into their recognition, showing how a path is formed by the steps that are walked.
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